Date: 1700, 1705

"Abstracted-Wit 'Tis own'd is a Disease, / But Sense-abstracted has no Power to please."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"For Sense, like Water, is but Wit condense, / And Wit, like Air, is rarify'd from Sense."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit is a King without a Parliament, / And Sense a Democratick Government."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit, like the French, wher'e'er it reigns destroys, / And Sense advanc'd is apt to Tyrannize."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit without Sense is like the Laughing-Evil, / And Sense unmix'd with Fancy is the D---l."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit is a Standing-Army Government, / And Sense a sullen stubborn P---t."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit, like the French, performs before it thinks, / And thoughtful Sense without Performance sinks."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Sense without Wit is Flegmatick and pale, / And is all Head, forsooth, without a Tail: / Wit without Sense is Cholerick and Red, / Has Tail enough indeed, but has no Head."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1700, 1705

"Wit, like the jangling Chimes, rings all in one, / Till Sense, the Artist, sets them into Tune."

— Defoe, Daniel (1660?-1731)

Date: 1704

"Erect your schemes with as much method and skill as you please; yet, if the materials be nothing but dirt, spun out of your own entrails (the guts of modern brains), the edifice will conclude at last in a cobweb; the duration of which, like that of other spiders’ webs, may be imputed to their be...

— Swift, Jonathan (1667-1745)